The minister stated that the government had lowered the whole corridor from Phase Two, Section Two of the coastal route, to effective pavements of 55km, including the 10 rail lines, in order to address the majority of compensation issues where a significant amount of important infrastructure were damaged.
Because of changes to the design, the Federal Government claims it is not paying compensation to impacted property owners from Kilometre Seven on the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway project.
Sen. Dave Umahi, the Minister of Works, made this statement on Saturday in Lagos while inspecting continuing construction on the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway as well as other road projects on the Dangote Tax Credit Route, Eleko, and the Lekki Free Trade Zone, among other axis.
The minister stated that the government had lowered the whole corridor from Phase Two, Section Two of the coastal route, to effective pavements of 55km, including the 10 rail lines, in order to address the majority of compensation issues where a significant amount of important infrastructure were damaged.
He said that the government had released about N10 billion so far in compensation.
Umahi said, “We are going to withhold compensation payment from Kilometer Seven because we have re-routed some of the sections, like the white sand beach.
“I know the indigenes have been praying very well. I think God has answered their prayers because we have also compressed the corridor to 55 effective pavements with 10 train tracks.
“We reduced the 10 tracks from 55 to 20, and we are taking it back also towards the beginning of this project.”
The minister said that after review, payment of the compensation would continue.
“For Section Two, we are going to have brand new enumerators so that they will also give us their opinions.
” It is going to be very, very fast,” the minister said.
According to Umahi, many properties are going to be saved.
He said, ” We saved all those cables and saved the whole community of Okunaja, by not only re-routing, but re-routing entirely through a swamp.
” I hear that some people are calling to protest that we are re-routing to the swamp, that we should go to the gazetted and then destroy the cables.
“I wonder what kind of people we are dealing with. It is very funny.
” I believe that they will see reasons to be very reasonable.”